July 21, 2007 has been flagged for the release of the final Harry Potter book. I know tons of people that read the book and I may be the only person on LibraryThing that has never read/owned an HP book. Though I have not missed a release date!

The last two releases were quite fun. Most of the bookstores in the city stay open through midnight to try and cash in on the hype. It’s fun to drive around town visiting all your favorite bookstores, checking out all the fans’ costumes, play a few games and eat some free snacks.

Then there is other side of a new Potter book coming out…

and that’s paper. The last two first-run printings of HP books cornered the paper market. I read that there was no paper for printing in NY for almost a week during the last run. I work for a small press and we had two books delayed 10 days because our printers in Canada couldn’t get any paper! Maybe the paper buyers, printers, etc. will plan better this go around.

But I’m sure it will just be an excuse to raise paper prices, yet again.